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20081008
Japan - Hong Kong - Indonesia - Taiwan
"Asian markets crumble, Nikkei 225 dives 9.4%: Hang Seng loses 8.2%, S&P/ASX 200 off 5%, Indonesia index slumps 10.4%." ... "Asian markets crumbled Wednesday, as investors alarmed by a deteriorating financial markets situation dumped blue-chip stocks to raise cash, sending several indexes tumbling down to multi-year lows." ... ""It's not just the hedge-funds, everybody is selling ... And there are no buyers," said Dale Tsang, managing director at Imperial Dragon Asset Management Co. in Hong Kong. "There is a state of panic, for cash. Everybody needs cash."" ... ""No, I haven't seen anything like this, and I don't think anybody has seen anything like this before, except those who are over 75 years old and have seen the Great Depression," Tsang added." ... "Japan's Nikkei 225 Average tumbled the most to close 952.5 points, or 9.4%, lower at 9,203.32 for its worst single-day percentage drop in years. The broader Topix index lost 8% to 899.01. Both benchmarks declined for a fifth straight session." ... "In Taipei [Taiwan's capital], the Taiex tumbled 5.8% to 5,206.40, its lowest level since July 2003. " -By V. Phani Kumar -MarketWatch

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20080813
John McCain - Randy Scheunemann - Politics - Georgia - Russia - Taiwan - Macedonia - Romania - Latvia - US - Law - 2008 Election
"McCain adviser got money from Georgia." ... "[2008 Election Republican Presidential Candidate] John McCain's chief foreign policy adviser and his business partner lobbied the senator or his staff on 49 occasions in a 3 1/2-year span while being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by the government of the former Soviet republic of Georgia." ... "The payments raise ethical questions about the intersection of Randy Scheunemann's personal financial interests and his advice to the Republican presidential candidate who is seizing on Russian aggression in Georgia as a campaign issue." ... ""Scheunemann's work as a lobbyist poses valid questions about McCain's judgment in choosing someone who — and whose firm — are paid to promote the interests of other nations," said New York University law professor Stephen Gillers. "So one must ask whether McCain is getting disinterested advice, at least when the issues concern those nations."" ... ""If McCain wants advice from someone whose private interests as a once and future lobbyist may affect the objectivity of the advice, that's his choice to make."" ... "Scheunemann's firm lobbied McCain's office on four bills and resolutions regarding Georgia, with McCain as a co-sponsor or supporter of all of them." ... "In addition to the 49 contacts with McCain or his staff regarding Georgia, Scheunemann's firm has lobbied the senator or his aides on at least 47 occasions since 2001 on behalf of the governments of Taiwan and Macedonia, which each paid Scheunemann and his partner Mike Mitchell over half a million dollars; Romania, which paid over $400,000; and Latvia, which paid nearly $250,000." -By Pete Yost -AP via -Yahoo

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20080619
Military - Tech - Safety - Investigation - Government - Accounting - Politics - US - Taiwan
"US N-weapons parts missing, Pentagon says." ... "The US military cannot locate hundreds of sensitive nuclear missile components, according to several government officials familiar with a Pentagon report on nuclear safeguards." ... "Robert Gates, US [Republican President Bush's] defence secretary, recently fired both the US Air Force chief of staff and air force secretary after an investigation blamed the air force for the inadvertent shipment of nuclear missile nose cones to Taiwan." ... "According to previously undisclosed details obtained by the FT, the investigation also concluded that the air force could not account for many sensitive components previously included in its nuclear inventory." ... "One official said the number of missing components was more than 1,000." ... "The disclosure is the latest embarrassing episode for the air force, which last year had to explain how a bomber mistakenly carried six nuclear missiles across the US." -By Demetri Sevastopulos -FT.com

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20080520
• John McCain - Randy Scheunemann - Money - Politics - Foreign - Macedonia - Republic of Georgia - Taiwan - Arizona - US - 2008 Election - Law - "McCain adviser's work as lobbyist comes to light." ... "[2008 Election Republican Presidential Candidate] John McCain's top foreign policy adviser lobbied the Arizona senator's staff on behalf of the republic of Georgia while he was working for the campaign, public records show." ... "Randy Scheunemann, founder of Orion Strategies, represented the governments of Macedonia, Georgia and Taiwan between 2003 and March 1, according to the firm's filings with the Justice Department. In its latest semiannual report, the firm disclosed that Scheunemann had a phone conversation in November about Georgia with Richard Fontaine, an aide in McCain's Senate office." ... "Orion Strategies earned $540,000 from its foreign clients over the year ending on [December] Dec. 1, reports show. Scheunemann also received $56,250 last year from March to July from McCain, according to campaign finance records." ... "The campaign consulting fees ended at a time when McCain was under financial pressure to cut costs, but Scheunemann remained the campaign's top foreign policy adviser. He represented McCain throughout last fall — including an appearance at a Republican Jewish Coalition event during the same week he lobbied McCain's Senate office." ... "Georgia paid Orion Strategies $240,000 in the year ending Dec. 1, reports show." -By Matt Kelley -USATODAY

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20070601
• Cheney - Douglas Feith - US - China - Taiwan - Iraq - Intelligence - Nuclear - Military - History - Politics - "Defense Officials Tried to Reverse China Policy, Says Powell Aide." ... "The same top [Republican President] Bush administration neoconservatives who leap-frogged Washington’s foreign policy establishment to topple Saddam Hussein nearly pulled off a similar coup in U.S.-China relations—creating the potential of a nuclear war over Taiwan, a top aide to former Secretary of State Colin Powell says." ... "Lawrence B. Wilkerson, the U.S. Army colonel who was Powell’s chief of staff through two administrations, said in little-noted remarks early last month that “neocons” in the top rungs of the administration quietly encouraged Taiwanese politicians to move toward a declaration of independence from mainland China — an act that the communist regime has repeatedly warned would provoke a military strike." ... "The top U.S. diplomat in Taiwan at the time, Douglas Paal [head of the American Institute in Taiwan], backs up Wilkerson’s account, which is being hotly disputed by key former defense officials." ... "With the election of George W. Bush in 2000, some of Taiwan’s most fervent allies were swept back into power in Washington, particularly at the Pentagon, starting with Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld." ... "They included such key architects of the Iraq War as Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary, Douglas Feith, the undersecretary for policy, and Steven Cambone, Rumsfeld’s new intelligence chief, Wilkerson said. President Bush’s controversial envoy to the United Nations, John Bolton, was another." ... "While Bush publicly continued the one-China policy of his five White House predecessors, Wilkerson said, the Pentagon “neocons” took a different tack, quietly encouraging Taiwan’s pro-independence president, Chen Shui-bian." ... "“The Defense Department, with Feith, Cambone, Wolfowitz [and] Rumsfeld, was dispatching a person to Taiwan every week, essentially to tell the Taiwanese that the alliance was back on,” Wilkerson said, referring to pre-1970s military and diplomatic relations, “essentially to tell Chen Shui-bian, whose entire power in Taiwan rested on the independence movement, that independence was a good thing.”" ... "Wilkerson said Powell would then dispatch his own envoy “right behind that guy, every time they sent somebody, to disabuse the entire Taiwanese national security apparatus of what they’d been told by the Defense Department.”" ... "“This went on,” he said of the pro-independence efforts, “until George Bush weighed in and told Rumsfeld to cease and desist [and] told him multiple times to re-establish military-to-military relations with China.”" ... "[Wilkerson, responding to denials of his assertions] “They are dangerous men who will lie about almost anyone or anything,” Wilkerson angrily responded by e-mail, singling out Feith, [former Rumsfeld spokesman Lawrence] DiRita, Cheney and Rumsfeld for scorn." ... "He called back-stage encouragement of the Taiwanese “even more serious” than the alleged manipulation of Iraq intelligence, because it could provoke China to attack the island, triggering a U.S. response and the world’s first nuclear shooting war." -By Jeff Stein -CQ.com

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20051213
• US - Taiwan - "US diplomat had affair with spy: A former top US diplomat has pleaded guilty to not disclosing a relationship with a Taiwanese intelligence officer." ... "Donald Keyser, 62, also pleaded guilty to illegally removing classified documents from the US State Department where he was employed until 2004." -BBC /News

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20051117
• China - Taiwan - Tech - "Chinese build a high-tech army within an army." ... "In a surprisingly short time, China has accomplished two feats. One, it has focused its energy and wealth on creating an army within an army. It has devoted huge amounts of capital to create a small high-tech army within its old 2.2 million-member rifle and shoe-leather force." ... "The specialty of this modern force, about 15 percent of the PLA [People's Liberation Army], is to conduct lightning attacks on smaller foes, using an all-out missile attack designed to paralyze, and a modern sea and air attack coordinated by high-tech communications. In other words, this new modern force is designed to attack Taiwan." ... "Second, China has taken painful but successful steps to create a "defense industrial base," or weapons-building capability. The PLA has improved its factory quality control and its ability to adapt foreign technology. It is bringing an indigenous small-wing F-10 fighter off the production line, and it is moving rapidly toward a "blue water" Navy with ships built in China." -By Robert Marquand -CSMonitor 

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20051116
• US - China - Japan - Taiwan - Free Speech - Religion - "Bush urges China to move towards democractic reform." ... "In a direct rebuke to China, President George W. Bush on Wednesday held up Japan and Taiwan as free and open societies, and warned that the people of China had "legitimate" demands for more freedom of speech and religion." ... "In a speech on US-Asia relations in Kyoto, the first stop on his four-country Asia tour, Mr Bush said: "As China reforms its economy, its leaders are finding that once the door to freedom is opened, even a crack, it cannot be closed."" ... ""[They want] more freedom to express themselves, to worship without State control and to print Bibles and other sacred texts without fear of punishment."" -By Caroline Daniel -FT.com 

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20050719
• -  -  -  - "China military build-up tipping balance against Taiwan - Pentagon." ... "The annual report to Congress said China's actual defense spending is estimated to be two to three times more than acknowledged by Beijing, or up to 90 bln usd this year, the largest in Asia and the third largest in the world after the US and Russia." ... "'The pace and scope of China's military build-up are, already, such as to put regional military balances at risk,' said the 45-page report, entitled 'The Military Power of the People's Republic of China.'" ... "It said China has deployed 650 to 730 mobile short range ballistic missiles in garrisons opposite Taiwan, and is adding to them at a rate of about 100   missiles a year, it said. Newer versions of the missiles have improved range  and accuracy." -AFXNews via -Forbes

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• -  -  -  - "China's Military Looks Beyond Taiwan, Pentagon Says (Update1)." ... "China is rapidly expanding its military capability, boosting its potential to strike beyond Taiwan and jeopardizing the balance of power in the region, the Pentagon said in a report to Congress." ... "The mobility of China's short-range missiles, coupled with advances in air and naval forces ``are scoped for operations beyond'' Taiwan, the report said. Continued advancements could provide it with a force capable of conducting various military operations in Asia ``well beyond Taiwan,'' the report said." -By Jeff St.Onge -Bloomberg

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• -  -  -  -  - "Rumsfeld Argues for Keeping China Embargo." ... "China cannot be certain that its military, while steadily strengthening, is capable of conquering Taiwan, the Pentagon said in a new report on Chinese military power and strategy." ... "Over the longer term, however, an increasingly modern Chinese military could pose a threat to U.S. and other forces in the Asia-Pacific region, it said." ... "Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday prior to the release of the report that it illustrates why a European arms embargo against the Chinese should be kept in place." ... "Some members of the European Union, including France, have sought an end to the embargo, which was imposed after the Chinese military crushed student protests in Tiananmen Square in 1989." -By Robert Burns -AP via -SFGate.com

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20050714
• -  -  -  - "Top Chinese general warns US over attack." ... "China is prepared to use nuclear weapons against the US if it is attacked by Washington during a confrontation over Taiwan, a Chinese general said on Thursday." ... "“If the Americans draw their missiles and position-guided ammunition on to the target zone on China's territory, I think we will have to respond with nuclear weapons,” said General Zhu Chenghu." -By Alexandra Harney, Demetri Sevastopulo, Edward Alden and Richard McGregor -FT.com 

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20050706
• Lesotho - Global -  -  -  -  - "Lesotho loses from global trade shift." ... "Long before dawn, the rush to Lesotho's textile factories starts through the darkness of the southern hemisphere winter." ... "Forty thousand people, almost all of them women, are wrapped in coats to keep them warm in the bitter cold." ... "Inside the factories, the hours are long. The workers only earn $38 (£20) a week, making clothes, mostly for the US market." ... "In recent years, Lesotho has gone through an industrial revolution. A nation of cattle-herders and farmers was transformed by the global economy." ... "But the garment industry is now struggling. Two years ago factories opened every month." ... "But the Chinese and Taiwanese owners have now gone home, after China was given better access to US markets and a fall in the US dollar." ... "This year several factories have closed. Thousands of jobs have gone." -By Barnaby Phillips -BBC /News 

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20050327
• -  -  - "Taiwanese protest China law: Antisecession bill lures hundreds of thousands to rally." ... "Several hundred thousand Taiwanese took to the streets yesterday to protest China's passage of a controversial antisecession law authorizing the mainland to use force if Taipei declares independence." ... "The rally, which organizers said drew 1 million people but police estimated at less than half that number, was as much about gaining foreign support as it was about rallying Taiwanese." -By Stephan Grauwels -AP via -Boston/Globe

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